The World's Most Outrageous Concept Cars!

This may sound strange, given that they are the foundation of a multi-billion dollar industry, but car manufacturers love to play games. 

Sometimes they have technical theories they want to prove. Sometimes they want to gauge customer reaction to an idea or a change in direction. 

Sometimes they just want the inches and the column headlines. 

If you go back to the 1950s and 1960s, concept cars were all about predicting the future. Nowadays, manufacturers tend to have a better understanding of what the future will actually look like, so the experimental vehicles they roll out fall into a few categories. 

There are “near production” concepts, where only the door handles, side mirrors and wheel sizes change between the motor show stand and the showroom. 

Often the result of a change in chief stylist, they previewed what the company's current vehicle lineup could look like in the coming years, showing everything from new headlights and colors to a new corporate grille treatment.

 Then there’s pretty much “everything else” – where internal fun and games come into the public eye, with the aim of raising the company’s profile or inspiring the younger members of its design team. 

Past Future

For some brands – particularly German premium manufacturers – their less relevant creations are often references to their history. 

BMW has made a name for itself by showing 'Hommage' concepts at key design events. Its most spectacular creation has been the M1, although it has also shown the 328 Hommage, the 3.0 CLS and, most recently, the 2002. 

None will go into production; they are simply seen as brand boosters, playing on a heritage that young upstarts like Lexus simply can't access. 

German brands are keen to play on their heritage, and BMW has created a series of 'Hommage' concepts that do little more than reference some of its most famous old models. This is the 328 Hommage, a 2011 tribute that marked the 75th anniversary of the original car. BMW.

Audi has also enjoyed this game; its 2011 quattro concept was a reminder of its original Quattro road car, a vehicle that introduced all-wheel drive to the masses and scored much motorsport success in rally racing. 

At the time of the car's reveal, there were rumors of a planned production run – but with each passing year, the likelihood grows that the quattro concept was Audi's gift to itself. 

Not that Germans aren't immune to a little future-oriented fantasy. 

BMW's GINA was a spectacular-looking sports car whose body was created from tensioned fabric stretched over a frame. 

BMW's GINA Concept wasn't meant to reach production – but its fabric 'bodywork' showed how the company was planning to develop the metal surfaces of its production cars. BMW.

It could have been seen as an attempt to reduce weight and construction cost, but it was actually an experiment in “skinning” – the way bodies are curved and shaped. 

The French like to play along too, celebrating the avant-garde design touches that made Citroën, Peugeot and Renault such popular choices in the Sixties. 

Very often, its designers use the freedom of concepts to experiment with types of vehicles that French brands find very difficult to sell. 

That usually means bigger cars – vehicles like Renault’s vast, bonkers and utterly invincible four-seater Nepta convertible, or the Peugeot Exalt. Neither will make it to showrooms, though the French are struggling to convince buyers that the interiors of their cars are similar to those of their fashion houses, so some of the more extrovert cabin finishes may make it to production. 

Wild and Crazy Rides

For sheer silliness, however, it's hard to beat Japanese brands, which love experimenting with technology and aren't afraid to ruin their history by screwing it up. 

For every Toyota, Mazda or Honda car that has made it to the scene, there are probably half a dozen that have left the rest of the world utterly baffled. And of course, the curiosity value is heightened by the tantalizing possibility that the car could end up being sold and seen on the streets of Kyoto. 

Toyota's Kikai concept is probably one such creation. 

It had a relatively low-key debut at the Japanese brand's stand at the 2015 Tokyo Motor Show, but it still grabbed plenty of headlines for its mechanicals on display. Could that make it into production? 

The odds are surely against it – but it's impossible to say never, given the curious nature of the Japanese market. 

The company's luxury subbrand, Lexus, had a less experimental but no less defined goal when it put one of its new NX crossovers on ice tires in 2015. 

After three months of research and planning by an ice sculptor, the NX actually drove down a London street in its frozen “rubber” – after a five-day freeze in preparation for the stunt. 

Lexus described the event as “an unprecedented fusion of art and engineering”; the reality is that it is designed to raise public awareness of the brand in the UK, where it has to work hard to win over traditional premium customers who prefer Mercedes, Audi and BMW. 

That’s the joy of the concept. They can be as relevant as a manufacturer wants them to be – a surreptitious attempt to gauge the reaction to something that’s actually on the drawing board waiting for a green light for production. Equally, they can be a completely irrelevant fantasy, a work of art, a gift to the company or an attempt to raise a flag and gain some public recognition. 

And with that kind of freedom, designers will always have something special. 

* Research Source: https://exame.com/casual/os-10-carros-conceito-mais-fantasticos-do-salao-de-frankfurt/

Snippets of Life Team October 25, 2018